What is the best cover song you’ve heard performed live by a band that has never recorded that song?
I pose the unavoidably convoluted question because last Friday I got my own answer: Casey Jamerson and her band performing The Dream Academy’s 1985 hit “Life in a Northern Town” under the Budweiser tent at the Missouri State Fair.
When I got home that night, I looked up the original version and Sugarland’s 2008 cover.
The former sounds kinda ’80s, but not in a good way (although I certainly give The Dream Academy credit for writing the song), and the latter version sounds kinda flat and rings false because it’s performed by a decidedly non-northern band (although I certainly give Atlanta-based Sugarland credit for reviving the tune).
(Right The Stars do a version that my friend Matt told me is the most rocking cover of the tune to be found online. Unfortunately, the band’s MySpace site is set to automatically play music so there’s no way to hear their version without the other music on top of it. For completists, there’s also a Rick Springfield version. Here’s a YouTube clip of some random person’s birthday video that used the song. And as long as we’re being thorough, here’s a video of three random kids harmonizing the song in their living room.)
Jamerson is a skilled and attractive singer from a farming community in mid-America (Pendleton, Ind., in her case, which indeed qualifies as a northern town, although it’s farther south than England, where The Dream Academy hails from). Despite her attributes, she’d be in danger of falling into the dime-a-dozen category except for one thing: Her band is just about the best freakin’ band I’ve ever heard.
(I shouldn’t get too carried away with my praise. It’s possible that mid-Indiana music fans are saying, “They’ve been playing that song for years, and I’m sick of it!” Their mastery of this song and Collective Soul’s “Shine” and the fact that they played identical sets for their afternoon and evening appearances does make me suspicious of their repertoire’s depth. But they can’t have been together all that long, because Jamerson’s only CD, released in 2006, doesn’t feature this lineup. And the smiles on the band members’ faces suggested that this song is still fresh to them.)
Jamerson introduces “Life in a Northern Town” by explaining that all seven band members can sing, and here’s a song to showcase that. And indeed, they can — you can’t help but smile when the keyboardist, who hadn’t said anything all day, contributes “Watch the water roll down the drain” without missing a note.
After comparing Jamerson’s band’s epic, rocking version (they call themselves a country band, but I don’t believe it) with The Dream Academy’s electronic take and Sugarland’s modern country attempt, I was sad that I couldn’t hear a recording of Jamerson’s version, but also happy in a bittersweet way. The best version of “Life in a Northern Town” has never been recorded, but I’ve heard it (twice in one day, in fact).
When thinking of your own answer to this question, keep in mind that it can’t be a cover that was recorded by the band. For example, maybe you saw a blistering take on “Whiskey in the Jar” at a Metallica concert, but that doesn’t count, because Metallica put that song on one of their albums.
It has to be a version that only exists in that moment when the band is playing it and you and other fans are there to bear witness. (I will allow examples that were recorded on audio or video for non-commercial purposes, of course, such as a fan-captured YouTube clip.)
In some cases, it might be an entirely fresh take on the original. For example, the following day under the Bud tent, I saw country duo Martin Ramey play a slow-burn version of “I Want You to Want Me” (and it worked well — on the verses, if not so much on the chorus).
In other cases, the cover might be completely faithful to the original, but a notch or two better (as was the case when Jamerson and her colleagues tackled “Shine” — and that’s no disrespect to Collective Soul, just a compliment to Jamerson’s band, which recognized the song’s full potential to rock).
Share you own favorite live, unrecorded cover song experience(s) in the comment thread below.